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Ms Lakin will be focusing on herring gulls and the lesser black-backed variety, which she describes as “misunderstood”.

She said: “They’re well known for stealing people’s food and they’re noisy and smelly.

“Day to day, people just don’t have a good relationship with them. One of the reasons they are able to take advantage of good nest sides and human food is because they are quite clever.”

Aggression in city gulls often takes place when parents are defending their chicks and when young gulls face a shortage of food and are at risk of starvation.

It is believed that fear for the health of their chicks leads the adult gulls to target people eating out of doors and swooping on them in desperation.

Ms Lakin will be splitting her time between Aberdeen and the Isle of May in the outer Firth of Forth to conduct research for the project, funded by the Natural Environment Research Council in collaboration with the British Trust for Ornithology and The University of St Andrews.

She added: “I’ve worked with gulls in the past so I’ve a strong interest in seabirds. When I saw the project I thought it would be perfect for me. I look forward to what we might find.”